Showing posts with label London. Show all posts
Showing posts with label London. Show all posts

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Greenwich Mean Time


What time is it? Nowadays there is only one correct answer to this question. This was not always true.
In 1859 a man in Dorset lost a court case because he was late. The court used Greenwich time. He used local time.
Even in small countries like Britain the local time varies a lot from place to place. Noon in Dorset is 17 minutes later than it is in London.
It was the development of the railways in the nineteenth century which made a national system of time keeping necessary. In 1880 the time at the Greenwich Observatory in London became the legal time for Britain.
Today GMT is the basis of time keeping all over the world. Nearly all countries have a national system which is so many hours ahead of or behind Greenwich.

Dreaming spires and production lines

Oxford is about 130 kilometers west of London.  It is an important centre of Industry. And of course the oldest and most famous university town in England.
But visitors frequently walk around asking: "Where is the university?"
In fact it is everywhere. The university has nearly 12,000 students in 28 separate collages. And each college has its own buildings. (Many date from the Middle Ages.)
The principal means of transport for the 17,000 students in Oxford is the bicycle. It is interesting that the principle industry of the town is cars - 17,000 people are employed by British Leyland(BL) alone.